Archives for February 2009

If you have been contemplating immigration to Canada, you would be wise to submit your application as soon as possible. Citing economic uncertainty and rising unemployment numbers in the country, Canadian Immigration Minister Jason Kenney has announced that Canada is considering reducing its immigration targets for 2009.

At the present time, Citizenship, Immigration and Multiculturalism Canada (CIMC) plans to maintain its 2009 immigration numbers of between 240,000 to 265,000 new Permanent Residents. This makes it one of the only developed nations that has not contracted its immigration plans in the face of current global economic turmoil.

However, that may change by the end of March, once Minister Kenney meets with federal, provincial, and territorial officials to review economic data and to determine if modifications to immigration levels are needed.

“We don’t want people coming to Canada and facing unemployment. We need to be sensitive to the changing labour market, and if we need to make modifications, we will,” stated Minister Kenney.

Taking a longer-term perspective, he has expressed his preference to maintain current levels, noting that immigrants will be greatly needed to help fuel Canada’s economic growth once the economy turns around.

“We need to be flexible, prudent and ensure that our response to short-term conditions does not counter out long-term goals, in which immigration will play a significant role,” he said. “We don’t want to turn off the tap of the future growth that is represented by immigration.”

The Immigration Minister has the authority to make changes to the immigration selection system without any advance warning. In this case, he has signaled that an imminent reduction of immigration targets is a real possibility.

If you would like to immigrate to Canada, you should take the Immigration Minister’s words seriously. Now is the time to submit your Canadian immigration application. After the Immigration Minister’s meeting at the end of March, it may become more difficult for you to qualify or it may take you longer to realize your plans to come live and work in Canada.

The Strategic Recruitment Stream of the Alberta Immigrant Nominee Program (AINP) has recently been shaken up to reflect the province’s changing labour needs. Its popular US H1B Visa Holder category (for which applicants do not need a job offer) has been modified to reflect key occupations that are common among H1B holders. Additionally, two new categories have been created, which focus on foreign engineers and foreign tradespeople with work experience in Alberta.

All three categories of Alberta’s Strategic Recruitment Stream allow candidates to apply directly to the AINP without having to get a job offer from an Alberta employer. It is an important fast-track option for Canadian immigration and a means for Alberta to build up its skilled labour force with workers from abroad.

This stream was originally created for US visa holders, to make it easier for skilled workers from overseas with American work experience to settle permanently in Alberta as immigrants. To qualify, applicants must have worked for at least one year in the US on an H1B visa* in an occupation that is considered “in-demand” in Alberta. The list of qualifying occupations has recently been amended to focus on key occupations that are common among H1B visa holders in the United States. The list includes various types of engineering occupations, IT professions such as database administrators, web designers, and software engineers, along with medical occupations such as physiotherapists and medical lab technicians.

In addition to the H1B occupations list, Alberta has also revised its requirements for H1B status. Previously, Alberta required that an applicant’s H1B status be valid only at the time of application; but it could elapse thereafter. Now, H1B status must be maintained until the AINP makes a final decision on the candidate.

The AINP is currently projecting total processing times of 2 to 6 months.

The Compulsory Trades Category and the Engineering Occupations Category are the newest additions to Alberta’s Strategic Recruitment Stream.

Only for these categories (not the H1B category), applicants must be able to prove that they are currently living in Alberta and that they intend to settle permanently in the province. They also must show that they are currently working or have previously worked in Alberta in their field. For engineers, previous work experience at a reputable Alberta engineering company must have been performed within the last 12 months.

In order to qualify, applicants in the Compulsory Trades Category are required to obtain an invitation from Alberta Apprenticeship and Industry Training (AIT) and must possess an Alberta Qualification Certificate in a Compulsory Trade.

Applicants in the Engineering Occupations Category must have been educated and trained as an engineer, designer, or drafter and have work experience in an engineering occupation on the AINP Engineering Occupations List. They also need to obtain a “Letter of No Objection” from the Association of Professional Engineers, Geologists, and Geophysicists of Alberta (APEGGA).

The AINP is continually evolving. Applicants who are qualified at the present time are encouraged to submit their applications now, as qualifying criteria may change without notice.

Though Canada has been less affected by the global economic downturn than the United States and other OECD nations, the national unemployment rate has increased slightly over the past several months. This has prompted Citizenship and Immigration Canada (CIC) to review immigration numbers to ensure that there will be enough jobs for newcomers once they arrive. Despite these trends, certain regions in Canada remain hot spots for jobs, where regional employers continue to seek skilled foreign workers to meet chronic labour gaps. Notably, the Canadian provinces of Saskatchewan, Alberta, and Manitoba are still experiencing skills shortages and continue to recruit foreign workers to alleviate them.

The January unemployment rates for Saskatchewan and Alberta came in at 4.1 per cent and 4.4 per cent respectfully; both under Alberta Employment and Immigration’s ‘balanced labour market’ rate of 5 per cent. Though these provinces have been impacted by current economic events, economists claim that they have been faring much better than other regions – some saying that the job market in Alberta remains among the best in North America.

Indeed, for many years Alberta has been recruiting foreign workers and Canadians from other regions to try to keep pace with the rapid job creation in the province. The Alberta Immigrant Nominee Program (AINP) has been very effective at welcoming skilled foreign workers, and is constantly evolving to reflect current conditions. Its Strategic Recruitment Stream for US H1B holders (for which candidates do not need a job offer) has recently been reworked to welcome applicants with experience in new occupations, such as industrial designers, database analysts and web developers.

Alberta’s two major cities, Calgary and Edmonton, recorded very low unemployment rates last month, at 4.1 and 3.8 per cent respectively. The areas of the province with the lowest unemployment rates were the Camrose-Drumheller region at 3.1 per cent and the Medicine Hat-Lethbridge region at 4 per cent.

Skills shortages also persist in Manitoba, where the provincial Immigration Minister is looking to offer jobs to skilled foreign workers in biotechnology, healthcare, information technology, social services, and geothermal energy. Temporary foreign workers in these industries may eventually be able to qualify for fast-track Canadian Permanent Residency under Manitoba’s Provincial Nominee Program (PNP).

For those deciding where to live when immigrating to Canada, the take-home message from this is simple: To maximize your chances for finding work in Canada, keep an open mind and consider choosing a region where unemployment is low and where your particular skills are in high demand.

What started as Ontario’s Pilot Provincial Nominee Program (PNP) in May 2007 has now come into its own as the full-fledged Opportunities Ontario Provincial Nominee Program. The Ontario PNP will now be welcoming a greater number of newcomers from a larger array of skilled occupations. The expansion of the program is great news for soon-to-be Canadian immigrants, many of whom plan to live in Ontario, as it offers a quicker and more efficient route to Canadian Permanent Residency.

On most days, I truly love what I do. Many lawyers spend their working lives locked in adversarial battles, where one side wins and the other loses. Not much fun, if you ask me. In my job I get to work in an environment, where most of the time there are no loses. Our clients nearly always get what they want… Canada gets what it needs… and I get to make a decent living from it all.